I would like a collective vote on your preferences of bots please.
Rcbot2 ftw!!!! ....this bots has more features and so easy to waypoint compared to those pesky cscz/css bots converted for tf2 which up to this day is still incomplete...the nav mesh is a nightmare to edit or create, SOMETIMES.
I find that the TFBots win when it comes to map compatibility and difficulty. I have done a RCBot VS TFBot battle royale and the TFBots won that one . (When I refer to TFBots, I also refer to other steam bots, although rcbot2 is in favor of tf2 or DODS [Which happens to not have it's own native bot]. Only TF2 seems to have a somewhat reliable default bot.) With the nav_generate command, I find TFBot to work on many more maps (of course, dedicated waypoint-makers like genmac are working hard to bring us new compatibility for maps .)
Did I mention that TFBots cheat a little?
But what RCBot2 lacks in compatibility and difficulty, it makes up with more gamemode support (rather than just a/d control points and king of the hill like with TFBots, RCBot2 supports all CP gamemodes, King of the Hill, Payload + Race, CTF and MVM with smooth waypoints. They do not cheat, and a recent update (v1.0) has made it possible to play with them just as you would with TFBots (Enabling achievements, no cheats to autoadd...) RCBots are able to wield a wide variety of weapons, including jarate (which makes TFBots crash the game). RCBot waypoints support rocketjumping, and RC-Engis will constantly move buildings, as well as help fellow engineers upgrade their own buildings. RCBots will also alert their team of sentries, spies and incoming enemies via voice chat. A small error that I find happens to RCBots is that they will sometimes get stuck. In this situation, the only way to save them is to kick and re-add.
I find that giving up difficulty and compatibility [TFBOTS] (since I'm not that good of a player anyway) is a worthwhile sacrifice for an overall more satisfying bot experience [RCBOTS]
Kudos to Cheeseh (and the development team, as well as our fellow waypointers!)
A few days ago, I was testing my personal MVM server's BLU team plugin, where I got to play as the robot army. The RCBOTS managed to beat me up real good .
Well TFbots have built-in aimbots to the max when their set at max difficulty so yeah they cheat bigtime haha!
There are still lots of stock map tfbots can't play unless you make or look for nav files for those certain maps.
TF engineer bots sometimes are very buggy like on the harvest maps they freakin won't leave the spawn area as they loop back and fort on the cabinet for some buggy reasons. Tried to fix that by adding block zones and other tricks I can think off on it's navs but they still keep doing the same bug over and over.
Rcbots are totally flawless on harvest maps so I use them exclusively on those certain maps and modes.
Well, the only thing that lets the original bots down is no support for other gamemodes, plus buggy on 5cp maps, since they mainly stick to the centre one (probably thinking it's koth) and red mainly plays as the defender. With rcbots, they can taunt on setup, which is fun and they also try to line themselves up to a partner taunt like high five, and even join in longer with kazotsky kick (forever until they die lol), whereas tfbots, you have to go to them and do the taunt in front of them to do the partner taunt or group taunt like the kazotsky kick, and they only do it for like 3-5 seconds.
Advantages with RCBots
They can join in with taunts. (glitchy with group taunts)
They can mess around at setup (whacking each other, taunting, and also say commands like "No, Place a Sentry Here" to mess around as well.
They are customisable separately with profiles (you can also have them all godly, by deleting all the profiles and having just one).
Can use custom weapons (glitchy with some and at setup e.g. Soldier using taunt while holding the equalizer, which ends up in him exploding and Scout whacking people with the melee bat, which deals damage to you if you miss your target).
Can rocketjump and stickyjump on some maps; the main ones I've noticed are ctf_2fort and cp_egypt_final.
More human (a bit) at not noticing you from a distance, unless you shoot.
They notice you as a spy, without touching them and even when you touch them, you can escape sometimes.
Can play on almost any mode (crash on some maps like the rd map)
Medics can mistake a spy as a healing target (very human); once on cp_gravelpit, a medic was healing me as a spy, and my heavy was shooting at the medic, while I was just standing there! xD
Scouts actively run around and make use of their agility.
All classes use melee weapons up close.
Heavies switch to their shotgun, if they run out of ammo.
Engis move their sentries, dispensers and upgrade their teleporters and remove sappers off them.
Engis support their other engi teammates e.g. a spy sapping their teammate's sentry and they both together remove the sapper and upgrade.
Snipers don't aimbot you, even on the highest difficulty in the head (headshot aimbot).
Can choose random classes and unpredictable ones too like in pubs.
Disadvantages with RCBots
They don't have an option to automatically generate a nav.
Ain't good at making the best decisions like running in the open at low health and defending on 5cp maps at the first cap at their base (engis make sense, but not others), medic heals heavy and heavy dies, and medic runs into combat and gets killed.
Some classes are glitchy; spies staying invisible, while looking at you and moving forward and calling for medic while you whack them to death, scouts run in the open towards sentries, engis sometimes only upgrade their sentry and ignore their dispenser, unless they look at it and their teleporter if they walk past it, snipers use good positions, but get killed easily and sometimes stand there on low health.
All classes are glitchy when picking up health and ammo crates; they forget it reappears after a while.
RCBots tend to all stand on the teleporter, and you can't get on because they push you away.
Demomen (from my experience) don't use stickies on sentry nests.
RCBots don't see you as a spy when you're slightly visible ( when you're shot at, touching them while in front of them, until after 5 seconds or more)
Are predictable due to waypoints.
Not the best team players; medic is healing heavy and once he goes around a wall, the medic forgets about him and runs elsewhere.
Glitchy with some custom weapons (to be expected). One example is that Demomen can't stickyjump if they have the Scottish Resistance weapon, due to having to look at the sticky for it to detonate.
Advantages with TFBots
Join in with partner taunts.
Have the option to generate a nav for the bots on cp, koth and pl maps, but will be glitchy on some, since it is automatic.
Taunt if you look at them and so do the enemies if you look at them; they also taunt you if you get killed by them (20% chance). (Nothing special, but still )
All classes do their job.
Human-like movements; not all going in the same pattern in the same direction e.g. one may sway left and right, while another just goes right through.
Excellent team players; stick together and know when to retreat for health.
They can play CP maps (Blue attacks, red defends)
They're clever at koth.
They understand Payload maps.
Medics target the best offensive classes and also hid behind cover while healing you.
Snipers get inpatient after 10 seconds (they move to another sniping positions if they haven't killed or spotted a target for 10 seconds) and uses the 'Jeers' voice command.
Soldiers wait until they're further away to shoot their rockets at you and also switch to their shotgun when they have to reload their rocket launcher.
Heavies make the most of their health.
Spies on expert walk around you to backstab you.
Spies on expert are 'expert' at shooting with their pistol.
Snipers are perfect with aiming, especially for headshots.
Demomen can use stickies (even at unlikely places that a human would rarely think of) to destroy sentry nests.
Disadvantages with TFBots
Demos like to fire at you, even when you're standing next to them, resulting in death for them, and possibly you.
Have the same AI as the robots in mvm on ctf.
Don't understand the uses of custom items; cloak and dagger, the pyros will airblast you while you're invisible, then forget about you.
Spies are predictable; when there's a group of enemies, it'll run back and forth next to them. You can also lead them to your team if you think you can't handle him alone.
Your bots seem to be stupid (even on expert) compared to the enemy bots e.g. the Sniper on your team isn't the best aimer, and the spy on your team tries to knife the enemies face.
Engis don't upgrade their teleporters.
Engis don't move up their sentry nests e.g. on dustbowl, if a blue engi is alive and you just capture the first point, the engi will setup a nest at the first control point, until he gets killed and the sentry is destroyed, then he'll either change class, or just constantly run into his death at the enemy.
Scouts, Soldiers, and Demos can glitch when trying to shoot sentries; shooting them through walls and killing themselves.
Pyros mainly airblast spam and run at you.
Heavies do not switch to their shotgun while in combat, until they don't see an enemy for at least 3 seconds, then he'll switch and grab an ammo crate and switch back to his minigun.
Engis are easy to kill; backstab engi, sap sentry (even if you die, the engi forgets about the place, unless the sentry was still up).
Medics are terrible with ubers; they only use them if you use the 2 commands "Activate Charge! and Go! Go! Go!" and if they're healing a bot, they will only use uber if they're on low health, or their victim is.
Snipers are such aimbots, they can kill you in mid air.
Red will most likely be the winner.
You can't see in the chat of when your bot teammate says "Spy!" or the Sniper using the 'Jeers' command.
@DreadedGoul575, A fine compiled list, however some issues I should point out:
1. TFBots really aren't team players, just look at their logic in 5cp and overall their strategies for attack/defense modes. The closest they get to sticking together is CTF and MvM (the bomb is literally a flag entity just using the bomb model).
2. TFBots really aren't that good at Payload. Their offensive logic is to stack the entire team on the cart with the exception of the classes that don't do the objectives, while Red sets up literally right in front of the Blue spawn gates.
3. While TFBot medics prioritize certain classes over the other, they don't take cover at all. They just try to get within healing radius of you and will sit completely still until you move out of their range. They also never attempt to pick up health packs (including thrown sandviches).
4. TFBots do understand custom items, however only the items VALVe decides to implement support for because of MvM.
5. Unlike CS: GO, there is no bot difficulty threshold so all bots are equivalent in skill level considering they're all on the same difficulty.
6. Engineer is definitely the worst class TFBots play. Besides not moving up their nest or upgrading their teleporters, sometimes they won't even built a teleporter. They also place every single building right next to each other with the exception of the entrance, of course. Engineers are also very flawed when it comes to shooting enemies, as if they are retreating sometimes they just shoot in the direction they're running in instead of aiming at the enemy. The only good thing that comes from Engineer bots is that they are very quick to set up their nests.
7. TFBot Medics do the same thing with humans in terms of being injured, however another issue I've had is when I call a medic bot that has full uber over to heal me he uses it for no reason as if he was triggered by the "MEDIC!" voice command as he would with "Activate Charge!" and "Go! Go! Go!".
8. Addition to advantages: TFBot spies disguise as the class they just backstabbed.
you might want to test your medic-take-cover theory
My honest opinion, tfbots are better, since the manage their classes well; rcbot scout runs around, which is realistic, but results in them running straight into sentries, rcbot and tfbot medics are clever in separate ways; tfbot medics heal all teammates next to them (when they decide to) and take cover, but don't use uber correctly (only when you're or the medic is low health or when a human victim says the 'go go go!' or 'Activate Charge!' commands, whereas the rcbot medic heals only one target, and if alone, they run straight towards the objective, resulting in death from sentries; they don't take cover, but know how to use their uber. Rcbot snipers don't know how to headshot people standing still and rcbot spies are clueless; shoot them, and they go invisible and run towards you whilst invisible yelling "Medic!". Rcbot engis are good, since there is an option of allowing them to move their buildings, however they sometimes only just level up their sentry and freeze (like all rcbots), whereas tfbot engis are a bit smarter, but even on expert, easy to backstab; sap their sentry and backstab (like rcbots). The main flaw with tfbot engis is the ability to move their buildings; if they moved their buildings on cp and pl maps, they would be better than rcbots, plus if valve put the time to update the bots, they could be really good.